As Mortgage Pool Shrinks, Lender Turns to LoanMarq for Leg Up

With the mortgage industry still in a state of tumult, lenders and investors are on the lookout for new and innovative methods to increase profits and make every aspect of the mortgage process run as smoothly as possible. Such was the goal of Mortgage Solutions, a Knoxville, Tenn.-based lender, when the firm turned to Sthenia Solutions and its LoanMarq software program.     LoanMarq is a complete loan processing and customer service application that allows all parties in a mortgage loan transaction to communicate and collaborate in a Web-based community interface modeled after popular social networking systems like Facebook and MySpace.     “LoanMarq is a social network for a mortgage transaction,” explained Sthenia CEO Paul Piers. “The lender can create a transaction and then invite all the key players in the transaction (into the loan’s Internet group), and LoanMarq collects all the documents and communications and updates every player.”    That automated updating is a key element of the system. LoanMarq tracks 70 key milestones in the mortgage process and updates all parties–including borrowers, agents, loan officers and insurers, among others–on the status of each milestone. This automation frees mortgage sales professionals to be out in the field selling loans and providing customer service, without having to busy themselves monitoring and delivering status updates to other parties involved in the deal. “Any party can log on and track the updates,” said Piers. “And any party can set it up to be emailed or texted about the updates.” Such automation, noted Piers, cuts costs and gives the mortgage lender a leg up against the competition, an especially important benefit now that the number of new loans has dwindled to a fraction of what it was just a few years ago.   Mortgage Solutions president Marvin Peek was quick to realize how the LoanMarq software could benefit his lending business. “It wasn’t a hard sale,” Peek said. “I’m a stickler for keeping people updated, and we had nothing like this.”    Peek’s firm decided to test the software on a loan that needed to close in just a few days.  LoanMarq passed that test with flying colors, helping the loan to close within a week, and Mortgage Solutions has been using it ever since. Speaking to the system’s ability to speed up the mortgage process, Peek characterized using LoanMarq as “like getting into a Ferrari.”    Mortgage Solutions was also able to brand the system with its own logo and messaging, further increasing its competitive advantage in the marketplace.     Piers said that LoanMarq is equally suited for the commercial and single-family home mortgage sectors. And as commercial property loans and commercial mortgage-backed securities are being seen by many as the next economic domino to fall, a system like LoanMarq can only help commercial lenders in making smart loans in a timely and organized fashion as the industry correction works itself out.     Sthenia is so confident in LoanMarq, Piers noted, that it gives prospective users a 30-day free trial period for the software, during which time clients can evaluate the program by applying it to a real-world situation, as Mortgage Solutions did before adopting the LoanMarq system full time.